Asus 7900GT card freezing. What to do?

[coolsti]

Just put together a PC with an Asus motherboard A8N32SLI-Premium and an
Asus 7900GT video card. One card only, so no SLI. The PC works very well,
no problems at all, and the graphics are fantastic. But we have now
experienced two sudden freeze-ups when playing Guild Wars. The sound is
ok, we are still in the game (we are playing on two separate computers
together) but the screen is just frozen. If we go back to Windows, we
cannot get the game screen up again, and we cannot get any other
application, such as task manager, to function. The mouse does move
around, but retains the game's cursor.

I installed this card with default settings, and the Nvidia console says
it is clocking at 450/660.

After experiencing these problems, I installed the Asus Doctor software
that came with the card, which is supposed to allow overclocking among
other things. As soon as I had this software installed, without changing
any settings, the PC started to sound like a vacuum cleaner or jet engine.
Apparently with this Smart Doctor simply installed, the card cooler was
running at max speed or something. It also seemed that some sort of high
overclocking was implemented. It also did not look like I had the option
to return the clock speeds as low as 450/660 again using Smart Doctor,
unless I did not understand the settings. So I uninstalled Smart Doctor
again.

Can someone explain what is going on with the Asus 7900GT?

1) What is this utility Smart Doctor actually doing? And how should I use
it correctly? I don't want to overclock, in fact I would rather underclock
if that is what it takes to remove freezing in Guild Wars.

2) Why the freezes and what to do about it? I can see from internet
searches that freezing in games is an issue with the 7900GT, but in
overclocking situations, and that is not what I am doing here.

Any suggestions and tips are welcome!

Steve, Denmark

 

[KC Computers]

Just put together a PC with an Asus motherboard A8N32SLI-Premium and an

Asus 7900GT video card. One card only, so no SLI. The PC works very well,
no problems at all, and the graphics are fantastic. But we have now
experienced two sudden freeze-ups when playing Guild Wars. The sound is
ok, we are still in the game (we are playing on two separate computers
together) but the screen is just frozen. If we go back to Windows, we
cannot get the game screen up again, and we cannot get any other
application, such as task manager, to function. The mouse does move
around, but retains the game's cursor.
Can someone explain what is going on with the Asus 7900GT?

What BIOS version are you using? ASUS came out with version
1205 which is says it added support for 7900 VGA chips.
There was probably some sort of compatibility issue with older
ones. Get the latest BIOS from:
http://support.asus.com/download/download.aspx?SLanguage=en-us&model=A8N32-SLI Deluxe

 

[coolsti]

What BIOS version are you using? ASUS came out with version 1205 which
is says it added support for 7900 VGA chips. There was probably some
sort of compatibility issue with older ones. Get the latest BIOS from:
http://support.asus.com/download/download.aspx?SLanguage=en-us&model =A8N32-SLI%20Deluxe

Hi and thanks for the reply!

My wife is on the said computer at the moment so I cannot check the exact
Bios version. But I did a quick look at the Asus Support pages to see what
was available, and it is a bit confusing. Our motherboard is the "premium"
version, not "delux" and there the latest version has the number "1009"
and no mention of any 7900 issues. Here is what the changes say:

1 Support new CPUs. Please refer to our website at:
http://support.asus.com/cpusupport/cpusupport.aspx 2. Fix unstable under
400MHz-Single channel issue. 3. Modify DDR max speedfrom 400MHz to 333Hz
when full loading

I find it indeed strange that the "deluxe" version would have had a recent
bios upgrade to fix a 7900 issue while the "premium" version, which should
be darn close in design, doesn't.

I have been an Asus fan for some years because I see their products as
being good quality. But I must admit, that when now dealing with their
(overly heavy and confusing) website, and the confusing technical
information available for their products, I think I will start to look
elsewhere in the future.

Steve, Denmark

 

[Clint]

Hmmm. Looks like the Asus card is one of the few 7900's that's not factory
overclocked. I had a eVGA 7600GT (factory over-clocked) that would lock up
sort of randomly when playing Oblivion. Could go a minute between lock-ups,
or 10. But it would freeze the game for 30 seconds or so, and then continue
on. Sometimes the sound would continue to stutter on, sometimes not.

In any case, I switched over to an ATI X1800GTO, and haven't had a single
problem since then. In troubleshooting, I went through about 3 versions of
NVidia drivers, a couple sets of motherboard driver sets, audio drivers,
multiple re-installs of the game, etc. No joy. Swap cards, and not one
issue since.

Given the issues I've read about with other 7900/7600 card owners, I'd
probably try RMA'ing the card, and see if that fixes your issue.

Clint

 

[coolsti]

Hmmm. Looks like the Asus card is one of the few 7900's that's not factory
overclocked. I had a eVGA 7600GT (factory over-clocked) that would lock up
sort of randomly when playing Oblivion. Could go a minute between lock-ups,
or 10. But it would freeze the game for 30 seconds or so, and then continue
on. Sometimes the sound would continue to stutter on, sometimes not.

In any case, I switched over to an ATI X1800GTO, and haven't had a single
problem since then. In troubleshooting, I went through about 3 versions of
NVidia drivers, a couple sets of motherboard driver sets, audio drivers,
multiple re-installs of the game, etc. No joy. Swap cards, and not one
issue since.

Given the issues I've read about with other 7900/7600 card owners, I'd
probably try RMA'ing the card, and see if that fixes your issue.

Clint

Yes, in my reading about this problem on the internet, it does seem that
Asus is one of the few that does not overclock by default. It also
apparently is a reason why the Asus version is not considered as
attractive to many. In my reading, it also sounds as if the overclocking
is the reason for a lot of things going wrong with the card. Not
necessarily due to heat problems but it sounds more like timing issues;
simply overclocking things beyond design timings does not scale up
correctly across the boards, or something like that.

Whatever. I just want this card to work at the design settings, that would
make me happy enough. Internet searches also point out that RMA'ing the
card may not help at all, unless the particular card I have is defective
or of a batch that since has had design improvements. We will wait and see
whether the game continues to freeze or if that problem is solved with my
recent changes.

What irritates me now is that I installed SmartDoctor from Asus, and got
it to adjust the fan speed on the card according to temperature (question:
just how is this done without installing SmartDoctor?) And now when
playing the game the fan is definitely running faster than it was before.
This may remove our freeze up problems, but wow, now the computer is
becoming noticeably loud, whereas before it was very silent. In other
words, thumbs down to the Asus 7900GT cooling fan! Too noisy. But I think
there is a fix for this, namely a Zalman cooler, but dong that would
definitely void any warranty on the card, so I will wait some time before
doing that step.

At this point I would definitely have bought an ATI card rather than
Nvidia, if only I had known better. But I don't want to have to go through
all the trouble it will take to convince where I bought this from to
exchange it outright for a completely different card.

Unfortunately I don't have a game like Oblivion to really stress test this
card. If the freeze-up problem is solved, and as soon as I replace the
noisy cooling fan, it will be a fine card.

Steve, Denmark

 

[Clint]

Well, I ended up replacing the fan on my Sapphire X1800GTO card with an
aftermarket cooler. BIG reduction in both temps and noise. Between doing
that and replacing my stock Intel cooler with a Scythe Ninja, the system is
almost silent. To be fair, the stock coolers were pretty quiet too, until
the fans started kicking into high gear. With the new fans though, it's
quiet all the time.

But yes, you're right. You will probably void your warranty replacing the
cooler. Although the place I bought mine from suggested some people had
luck by slapping the old cooler back on for warranty purposes.

With my 7600GT, the temps weren't exceptionally high as reported by the
drivers. But the reading I did suggested there was other parts that weren't
cooled or monitored that were overheating. Perhaps if you could run with
the cover off, and set a fan to blow into the case, just to test?

Clint

 

[johns]

Almost has to be to allow the ASUS or nVidia driver to
control fan speed. I'm testing a 7900GT in a Dell 9150,
and the first thing I noticed during a reinstall of the OS,
was as soon as the Dell 7900 driver loaded the fan
quietened down a lot. I have another machine with the
7900GTO that could not control the fan speed, so I
installed a Zalman cooler. I called tech support on both
cards, and neither Dell or BFG had a clue about
controlling fan speed on the 7900. And without that
control, the 7900 is a screamer. You can't live with that
noise. Here's my guess about the lockup in Oblivion ..
I think if you have a BIOS which supports control of
fan speed by the video driver, then you will have no
problems. But, if the video driver calls for fan speed
control, and the BIOS does not support it, then there
may be conflicts that take the OS down. In the case
of my board with the Zalman cooler, the video card
temp never gets above about 48 C ... meaning the
call for more fan speed is never triggered. You might
try setting that threshold higher in the driver, except
the stock cooler lets the card temp go in the high
50s and more.

johns

 

[coolsti]

Almost has to be to allow the ASUS or nVidia driver to
control fan speed. I'm testing a 7900GT in a Dell 9150,
and the first thing I noticed during a reinstall of the OS,
was as soon as the Dell 7900 driver loaded the fan
quietened down a lot. I have another machine with the
7900GTO that could not control the fan speed, so I
installed a Zalman cooler. I called tech support on both
cards, and neither Dell or BFG had a clue about
controlling fan speed on the 7900. And without that
control, the 7900 is a screamer. You can't live with that
noise. Here's my guess about the lockup in Oblivion ..
I think if you have a BIOS which supports control of
fan speed by the video driver, then you will have no
problems. But, if the video driver calls for fan speed
control, and the BIOS does not support it, then there
may be conflicts that take the OS down. In the case
of my board with the Zalman cooler, the video card
temp never gets above about 48 C ... meaning the
call for more fan speed is never triggered. You might
try setting that threshold higher in the driver, except
the stock cooler lets the card temp go in the high
50s and more.

johns

Thanks Johns,

most of what you say makes sense. When I first set up the machine, I did
not install the Asus SmartDoctor software for the video card. I assumed
this was something extra, like a utility, and I do not like installing
every bit of background-running software that is provided unless it is
needed. When we turned on the PC, the video card fan was very loud,
suggesting it was running at 100%, until Windows kicked in. So same here
as you experienced: the driver under Windows took control of the card fan
and reduced its speed drastically.

What I am wondering about still is, if one never ever installs
SmartDoctor, then what will adjust the speed of the video card fan? I have
a suspicion that my fan was set to lowest speed (or no speed at all) when
Windows kicked in, and then was never increased again when needed while
gaming. Or, perhaps as you suggest, it was a conflict due to a speed
control support that was not there.

The fan on this card is a screamer and I will eventually replace it with a
Zalman. As soon as I otherwise can see that the card is defect free, so I
don't need to worry about warranty issues.

- Steve, Denmark

 

[coolsti]

Well, I ended up replacing the fan on my Sapphire X1800GTO card with an
aftermarket cooler. BIG reduction in both temps and noise. Between doing
that and replacing my stock Intel cooler with a Scythe Ninja, the system is
almost silent. To be fair, the stock coolers were pretty quiet too, until
the fans started kicking into high gear. With the new fans though, it's
quiet all the time.

But yes, you're right. You will probably void your warranty replacing the
cooler. Although the place I bought mine from suggested some people had
luck by slapping the old cooler back on for warranty purposes.

With my 7600GT, the temps weren't exceptionally high as reported by the
drivers. But the reading I did suggested there was other parts that weren't
cooled or monitored that were overheating. Perhaps if you could run with
the cover off, and set a fan to blow into the case, just to test?

Clint

I have a question to anyone with experience exchanging the cooler on their
graphic card with another one, for example by Zalman. When you do this,
what happens to fan speed control? What controls the speed of the new
cooler fan? With my 7900GT card, and if I use the Asus software
SmartDoctor, the fan speed can be adjusted in various stages according to
card temperature. What do you do when you replace the stock cooler with
something else?

Steve, Denmark